The Splendid Idle Forties: Stories of Old California

Ysabel sat in the low window-seat of her bedroom, pretending to draw the threads of a cambric handkerchief.  But her fingers twitched, and her eyes looked oftener down the hill than upon the delicate work which required such attention.  She wore a black gown flowered with yellow roses, and a slender ivory cross at her throat.  Her hair hung in two loose braids, sweeping the floor.  She was very pale, and her pallor was not due to the nightly entertainments of Monterey.

Her dueña sat beside her.  The old woman was the colour of strong coffee; but she, too, looked as if she had not slept, and her straight old lips curved tenderly whenever she raised her eyes to the girl’s face.

There was no carpet on the floor of the bedroom of La Favorita of Monterey, the heiress of Don Antonio Herrera, and the little bedstead in the corner was of iron, although a heavy satin coverlet trimmed with lace was on it.  A few saints looked down from the walls; the furniture was of native wood, square and ugly; but it was almost hidden under fine linen elaborately worked with the deshalados of Spain.

The supper hour was over, and the light grew dim.  Ysabel tossed the handkerchief into Doña Juana’s lap, and stared through the grating.  Against the faded sky a huge cloud, shaped like a fire-breathing dragon, was heavily outlined.  The smoky shadows gathered in the woods.  The hoarse boom of the surf came from the beach; the bay was uneasy, and the tide was high:  the earth had quaked in the morning, and a wind-storm fought the ocean.  The gay bright laughter of women floated up from the town.  Monterey had taken her siesta, enjoyed her supper, and was ready to dance through the night once more.

“He is dead,” said Ysabel.

“True,” said the old woman.

“He would have come back to me before this.”

“True.”

“He was so strong and so different, mamita.”

“I never forget his eyes.  Very bold eyes.”

“They could be soft, macheppa.”

“True.  It is time thou dressed for the ball at the Custom-house, niñita.”

Ysabel leaned forward, her lips parting.  A man was coming up the hill.  He was gaunt; he was burnt almost black.  Something bulged beneath his serape.

Doña Juana found herself suddenly in the middle of the room.  Ysabel darted through the only door, locking it behind her.  The indignant dueña also recognized the man, and her position.  She trotted to the door and thumped angrily on the panel; sympathetic she was, but she never could so far forget herself as to permit a young girl to talk with a man unattended.

“Thou shalt not go to the ball to-night,” she cried shrilly.  “Thou shalt be locked in the dark room.  Thou shalt be sent to the rancho.  Open! open! thou wicked one.  Madre de Dios!  I will beat thee with my own hands.”

But she was a prisoner, and Ysabel paid no attention to her threats.  The girl was in the sala, and the doors were open.  As De la Vega crossed the corridor and entered the room she sank upon a chair, covering her face with her hands.

He strode over to her, and flinging his serape from his shoulder opened the mouth of a sack and poured its contents into her lap.  Pearls of all sizes and shapes—­pearls black and pearls white, pearls pink and pearls faintly blue, pearls like globes and pearls like pears, pearls as big as the lobe of Pio Pico’s ear, pearls as dainty as bubbles of frost—­a lapful of gleaming luminous pearls, the like of which caballero had never brought to doña before.

For a moment Ysabel forgot her love and her lover.  The dream of a lifetime was reality.  She was the child who had cried for the moon and seen it tossed into her lap.

She ran her slim white fingers through the jewels.  She took up handfuls and let them run slowly back to her lap.  She pressed them to her face; she kissed them with little rapturous cries.  She laid them against her breast and watched them chase each other down her black gown.  Then at last she raised her head and met the fierce sneering eyes of De la Vega.

“So it is as I might have known.  It was only the pearls you wanted.  It might have been an Indian slave who brought them to you.”

She took the sack from his hand and poured back the pearls.  Then she laid the sack on the floor and stood up.  She was no longer pale, and her eyes shone brilliantly in the darkening room.

“Yes,” she said; “I forgot for a moment.  But during many terrible weeks, señor, my tears have not been for the pearls.”

The sudden light that was De la Vega’s chiefest charm sprang to his eyes.  He took her hands and kissed them passionately.

“That sack of pearls would be a poor reward for one tear.  But thou hast shed them for me?  Say that again.  Mi alma! mi alma!”

“I never thought of the pearls—­at least not often.  At last, not at all.  I have been very unhappy, señor.  Ay!”

The maiden reserve which had been knit like steel about her plastic years burst wide.  “Thou art ill!  What has happened to thee?  Ay, Dios! what it is to be a woman and to suffer!  Thou wilt die!  Oh, Mother of God!”

“I shall not die.  Kiss me, Ysabel.  Surely it is time now.”

But she drew back and shook her head.

He exclaimed impatiently, but would not release her hand.  “Thou meanest that, Ysabel?”

“We shall be married soon—­wait.”

“I had hoped you would grant me that.  For when I tell you where I got those pearls you may drive me from you in spite of your promise—­drive me from you with the curse of the devout woman on your lips.  I might invent some excuse to persuade you to fly with me from California to-night, and you would never know.  But I am a man—­a Spaniard—­and a De la Vega.  I shall not lie to you.”

She looked at him with wide eyes, not understanding, and he went on, his face savage again, his voice harsh.  He told her the whole story of that night in the mission.  He omitted nothing—­the menacing cross, the sacrilegious theft, the deliberate murder; the pictures were painted with blood and fire.  She did not interrupt him with cry or gasp, but her expression changed many times.  Horror held her eyes for a time, then slowly retreated, and his own fierce pride looked back at him.  She lifted her head when he had finished, her throat throbbing, her nostrils twitching.

“Thou hast done that—­for me?”

“Ay, Ysabel!”

“Thou hast murdered thy immortal soul—­for me?”

“Ysabel!”

“Thou lovest me like that!  O God, in what likeness hast thou made me?  In whatsoever image it may have been, I thank Thee—­and repudiate Thee!”

She took the cross from her throat and broke it in two pieces with her strong white fingers.

“Thou art lost, eternally damned:  but I will go down to hell with thee.”  And she threw herself upon him and kissed him on the mouth.

For a moment he forgot the lesson thrust into his brain by the hideous fingers of the desert.  He was almost happy.  He put his hands about her warm face after a time.  “We must go to-night,” he said.  “I went to General Castro’s to change my clothes, and learned that a ship sails for the United States to-night.  We will go on that.  I dare not delay twenty-four hours.  It may be that they are upon my heels now.  How can we meet?”

Her thoughts had travelled faster than his words, and she answered at once:  “There is a ball at the Custom-house to-night.  I will go.  You will have a boat below the rocks.  You know that the Custom-house is on the rocks at the end of the town, near the fort.  No?  It will be easier for me to slip from the ball-room than from this house.  Only tell me where you will meet me.”

“The ship sails at midnight.  I too will go to the ball; for with me you can escape more easily.  Have you a maid you can trust?”

“My Luisa is faithful.”

“Then tell her to be on the beach between the rocks of the Custom-house and the Fort with what you must take with you.”

Again he kissed her many times, but softly.  “Wear thy pearls to-night.  I wish to see thy triumphant hour in Monterey.”

“Yes,” she said, “I shall wear the pearls.”